Risk factors for addiction

Question 1

How many risk factors are there for addiction

Answer 1

5

Question 2

What are the risk factors for addiction

Answer 2

• genetic vunerability
• stress
• personality
• family influences
• peers

Question 3

define genetic vunerabilty as a risk factor

Answer 3

Any inherited predisposition that increases the risk of a disorder or condition

Question 4

Explain genetic vunerability as a risk factor for addiction

Answer 4

Their are 2 plausible mechanisms that create genetic vunerability
1. the D2 receptor - where dopamine transmittion is affected by the number of dopamine receptors you have, and this number is genetically controlled. There are different types of dopamine receptors including the D2. People who become addicted have an abnormally low number of D2 receptors which means less dopamine activity - so the addiction could be a way of compensating for this deficiency.
2. The Nicotine enzyme CYP2A6 - some individuals are able to metabolise certain substances, and this is linked to addiction. Expression of this enzyme is genetically determined

Question 5

Give some research to support the Nicotine enzyme CYP2A6 explanation of genetic vunerability as a risk factor for addiction

Answer 5

Pianezza et al 1998:
found that some people lack a fully functioning CYP2A6 enzyme which metabolises nicotine. These people also smoked significantly less than smokers with the fully functioning version.

Question 6

Give research to support genetic vunerability as a risk factor fo addiction

Not Pianezza

Answer 6

Kendler et al 2012:
used data from the national swedish adoption study.
They looked at adults who had been adopted away, as children, from biological families in which at least one parent had an addiction.
These children later had a significantly greater risk of developing an addiction themselves, compared with adopted away individuals with no addicted parents in their biological families.

Question 7

Evaluate genetic vunerability as a risk factor for addiction

Answer 7

W - reductionist - ignores the environment
W - No concordance rates in twin studies have ever shown 100% concordance, so there is a genetic predisposition but this does not mean a genetic cause.
S - Supporting evidence from Kendler et al 2012, and Pianezza et al 1998

Question 8

define stress as a risk factor of addiction

Answer 8

Stressful life events and traumatic experiences in childhood and adulthood are important risk factors for addiction.

Question 9

Give human research to support stress as a risk factor for addiction

Answer 9

Andersen and Teicher 2008:
- Highlighted the role of adverse childhood experiences in later addiction.
- They argue that early experiences of severe stress have damaging effects on a young brain in a sensitive period of development.
- This creates greater vunerability to later stress.
- Further stressful experiences triggers the early vunerability and make it more likely that the person will self-medicate with addictions.

Question 10

Give human research to support stress as a risk factor for addiction

Answer 10

Piazza 1989:
- tested rats for vulnerability to addiction through stress.
- They stressed the rats by pinching their tails.
- They found that rats were more likely to seek out and ingest amphetamines the more stressed that they got.

Question 11

Evaluate stress as a risk factor for addiction

Answer 11

• W - difficult to establish cause and effect. Addiction could cause high stress levels as opposed to the other way around.
• W - Stress research is often conducted on animals due to ethical issues. Therefore, the stress levels induced in the animals is not actually know. The research can therefore lack validity
• S - Stress can be linked with biological explanations of addiction such as changes in neurotransmitter levels and changes to brain structure development. It can therefore start to form a more holistic account of risk factors for stress.

Question 12

define personalilty as a risk factor for addiction

Answer 12

Various traits can increase an individual’s risk of addiction, a significant one being impulsivity.

Question 13

What is the research to support personality as a risk factor for addiction

Answer 13

• Wan-Sen Yan 2013
• Bahlmann et al 2002

Question 14

Outline Wan-Sen Yan 2013

Answer 14

Wan-Sen Yan 2013:
- found a relationship between personailty characteristics and addiction.
- They found that high levels of neuroticism and psychotisicm alongside low levels of extroversion were linked to internet addiction.

Question 15

Outline Bahlmann et al 2002

Answer 15

Bahlmann et al 2002:
- interviewd 55 alcohol-dependent people of which 18 were diagonsed with antisocial personaility disorder (APD).
- For these 18 participants, the researchers found that APD developed 4 years before their alcohol dependency on average.
- This suggests that APD is indeed a personality-related risk factor for alcohol addiction.

Question 16

Evaluate personality as a risk factor of addiction

Answer 16

• W - difficult to establish cause and effect when considering personality and addiction. Hard to conclusively say that certain personality traits cause addiction and not vice versa.
• W - reductionistic - The possession of certain traits does not automatically mean that addiction will occur. There are lots of other factors that can contribute to the formation of addiction
• S - Evidence suggests that there are personality traits that increase the likelihood of becoming an addict

Question 17

Define family influences

not in reference to addiction

Answer 17

The capacity or power of the family to be a compelling force on or produce effects on the actions, behaviour, opinions of others.

Question 18

Define family influence as a risk factor for addition.

Answer 18

How much an at-risk individual believes their parents approve of addictive substances or behaiours is an influential risk factor

Question 19

What is the research to support family influence as a risk factor of addiction

Answer 19

• Livingston et al 2010
• Madras et al 2019

Question 20

Outline Livingston et al 2010

Answer 20

Livingston et al 2010:
found that final-year high-schoolers who were allowed by their parents to drink alcohol at home were significantly more likely to drink excessively the following year at college.

Question 21

Outline Madras et al 2019

Answer 21

Madras et al 2019:
found a strong positive correlation between parent’s use (abuse) of cannabis and their adolescent children’s use of cannabis, nicotine, alcohol and opiods.
It may be that adolescents observe their parents using a specific drug and model this behaviour.

Question 22

Evaulate family influence as a risk factor of addiction

Answer 22

• D - Observation of a behaviour does not necessarily mean imitation. There are other mediating cognitive factors that also have an influence on motivation to perform that particular behaviour. For example, a family member smoking does not necessarily mean a child will also smoke, especially if other sources have warned against it (e.g. peers and educators).
• W - It is difficult to ascertain whether family influence is more or less important than other factors affecting the risk of addiction.

Question 23

define peer pressure as a risk factor for addiction

Answer 23

The attitude of peers towards addictive substances/ behaviours becomes highly influential in increasing the risk of an addiction developing in adolescence

Question 24

What is the research for peer pressure as risk factor for addiction

Answer 24

• Leshner 1998
• O’Connell et al 2009

Question 25

Outline Leshner 1998

Answer 25

Leshner 1998:
- advocates treatment strategies that include social context elements, such as peer groups, as well as biological and behavioural elements if they are going to be successful.
- This is because recovering addicts may relapse if they return to the initial social context,
- suggesting that peer influence could be a risk factor.

Question 26

Outline O’Connell at al 2009

Answer 26

O’Connell et al 2009:
suggests there are 3 major elements to peer influence as a risk factor for alcohol addiction:
- An at-risk adolescent’s attitudes and norms about drinking are influenced by associating with peers who use alcohol.
- These experienced peers provide more oppertunities for the at-risk individual to use alcohol.
- The individual overestimate of how much thier peers are drinking, which means they drink more to keep up with the percieved norm.

Question 27

Evaluate peer pressure as a risk factor for addiction

Answer 27

• S - real world application - social norms marketing advertising - is an intervetion to change mistaken beliefs about how much peers are drinking. It uses mass media advertising to provide messages and statistics about how much people really drink. i.e. beer mat in a SU might say students overestimate what others drink by 44%.
• W - Peer influences are just one part of an individual’s social context. Other influences could come from family, social deprivation or economic status. Vulnerability to dependency is likely to be related to a combination of these things.

Question 28

Give weaknesses for looking at risk factors for addiction

Answer 28

• focus on individual risk factors so ignore the effect of interactions. Mayes and Suchman 2006 found that combinations of risk matter more than single factors and the different combinations can determine the severity and nature of the addiction
• focus on the risk element of the factors and ignore that they can also be positive factors that contribute to preventing addiction